Social Networking

The Day of Surgery – My Gastric Bypass Surgery

PublishedOctober 25, 2010

I wish I had been writing this as it happened, so that I could have given you the raw emotions behind everything that happened as it was happening, but that was pretty much impossible, however I did have my trust IPad with me in the hospital and I was taking notes so that I knew what to write about later, so it’s time for us to catch up a bit and talk about the surgery, my hospital stay and all the experiences that I had over the last week. You and I have a lot of catching up to do my friends, bare with me; will get there over the next few days.

So it’s Tuesday morning, and I can’t sleep to save my life. I’ve tossed and turned all night and finally at 6am I’ve given up on sleep.

The morning starts with my pre operative shower with Hibiclens Antimicrobial soap as instructed by my surgeon. After that it’s time to get the care loaded up and then Jason and I are off to the hospital.

We arrive at the hospital right on time, check in an find out that the blood work that I came out and did yesterday, never seemed to get registered. Now this is pretty funny to me, though it is a bit perplexing to most of the hospital staff. When I came in yesterday to do the blood work they told me they were running three tests and one of them was a pregnancy test. I laughed; since I’m about seven years post hysterectomy, them running a pregnancy test on me was pretty hilarious! Now I find out that it’s as if I was never here at all yesterday, and they need to take all that blood work again this morning. No big deal, I don’t mind. First thing is first though it’s time for the weight in. I’ve been wondering how I have done these last two weeks, did I lose more weight? I step on the scale, and all of the sudden I see three numbers that make me want to absolutely die. 3 – 4 – 6. 346!! WHAT? NO! THAT IS IMPOSSIBLE! I start saying this aloud to the nurse that is standing there. “That is impossible, there is no way, no possible way,” I am starting to panic; they are going to cancel my surgery I just know it! I gained weight, how is this possible? I was so good! How did this happen! I’m about to cry! The nurse looks at me and very calmly says “That is your weight in Kilograms, would you like me to switch it to pounds?” OH THANK YOU JESUS! Suddenly I see three new numbers and my heart starts to calm again… 3-2-4. 324. Yes, that, that I can be happy with. Thank you nurse I could kiss you right now.

Now we are off into my little pre-surgical room, time for me to take off my clothes, put on my gown and my pretty little blue hat and cute little hospital socks with the safe walking soles and time for me to answer all the questions about my medical history, confirm all the information I gave during my pre assessment appointment and check all the information on my ID bracelet. Once that is done we have the task of starting my IV, and let me tell you folks, this is going to be a painful experience. A few different nurses look and my arm and confirm I am going to be a hard stick. They try to warm up my veins with warm blankets a few times, no go, the first nurse tries to stick me in my right arm, no luck, a second stick in the left, no luck, a third stick in the left, no go, time to let someone else try. This nurse finds one in my left hand, she has to use a smaller needle than they wanted to use, but that’s alright, she’s got an IV started, they can draw my blood through that, and now, I am, ready for surgery.

The surgeon is running a bit late and everyone keeps apologizing to me. I keep telling them to take their time; I mean I don’t want her rushing on me, so I sure don’t want her rushing on the person before me. I’m very patient, I’ve waited months to get here, what is another hour or two.

Now the Anesthesiologist comes in to introduce himself, nice guy, I’ll see him one more time in my whole life and never again. He lets me know what to expect, off he goes, in comes my Surgeon, we’ll be ready to go in just a few minutes, time to kiss Jason goodbye for now, and now they are wheeling me down the hall and into the operating room. I get to say hello to a team of nurses assisting my Surgeon, and I get to smile at the Anesthesiologist again. They help me scoot over to the operating table and are propping my arms up and outward on the arm rests. The Anesthesiologist tells me he’s going to give me a little something to help me calm down just a bit and then… I’m in the recovery room waking up and I’ve had my gastric bypass. Wow that all happened so fast!

It’s about 6:30pm and they are moving me into a normal room. There is Jason again, smiling at me, and all I keep asking everyone is if I can get up and walk please. Yes let’s walk! They told me walking would be the best thing for me so I’m ready get me out of this bed and let’s walk…ok maybe a LITTLE nap first, but then we’ll walk. My first walk down the hall was at 7:30pm and I’ve got the pictures to prove it. Now all I want is a drink of water, but no, all I get is that stupid little lollipop sponge that I can dip in water and swab around my mouth. The next 12 hours are going to be miserable… water is all I can think of. But I’ll keep walking because I know that’s what I need to do.

One Response to The Day of Surgery – My Gastric Bypass Surgery

About (Pandora) The Author

Jaime "Pandora" Williams

Check Out BariLife

The kind people at BariLife have been generous enough to send me to Paris to represent the WLS Community in the inaugural RunDisney Paris Disney Half Marathon.
Please take the time to visit their website and check them out! Be sure to tell them Pandora sent you!

Subscribe to Blog via Email

Enter your email address to subscribe to this blog and receive notifications of new posts by email.